


Lost Souls

by Macdicilla



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Liberal borrowing from the scriptures, Loss, M/M, Major character crying, recongnition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-03
Updated: 2015-08-03
Packaged: 2018-04-12 17:26:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4488261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Macdicilla/pseuds/Macdicilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is an angel who looks into hell three times a day and three times a night and weeps. It is the angel Israfel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost Souls

**Author's Note:**

  * For [athousandelegies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/athousandelegies/gifts).



There is an angel who looks into hell three times a day and three times a night and weeps. It is the angel Israfel. He no longer remembers the name of the one for whom he is looking, but he is sure that if he heard the name, he'd recognize it. 

He had a dear friend once, but that was before the fall of the wicked angels from heaven. It was like a pipe burst to leak an ocean, horresco referens, and it's best not to dwell on these things. 

"He sinned against our God, like the others." The Archangel St. Michael tells Israfel gently. "Do not be so affected by the loss of the wicked."

(The just man is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. 

Not so the wicked, not so. For they are like chaff which the wind blows away.)

Chaff burns quickly and hell is hot. Israfel's tears are as warm after a century as they were at the beginning (and ever shall be world without end amen.)

(No, that's not quite right.)

•

Israfel had a friend once but he doesn't recognize him with all the scales and looks for him elsewhere. It's fruitless, that search, like a damnable fig tree whose leaves are dark green and lush and hold nothing. 

(Nothing wrong with the leaves themselves, though. It's the deception. Though the poor tree must be confused and scared out of its wits.)

•

It rains heavily in London as if the promise never to flood the earth only applied to the levant, and two beings are sharing the fifth bottle of wine on a couch in the back of a shabby Soho bookstore. 

"D'you remember the old days, my dear?" Asks Aziraphale. "Heaven and all that–" he waves a hand vaguely "–stuff?"

"Mm," says Crowley, "but only bitss and piecess."

Aziraphale nods, either sagely or sleepily. 

"It was really lovely. None of that thwarting or wiling. Peace on earth. Or no, there wasn't any earth yet. But so, so lovely."

"Was it?" Replies Crowley testily. 

"Mmm," says Aziraphale with his eyes closed, remembering a sense memory of calm light and fingers on his wings. Whose fingers were they? Oh, they were– there was a name, and he can't grasp it. It's lost forever. He hiccups and it turns into a sob. 

"Shh-shh-shh." Says Crowley, who can't be irritated any longer. "There, there. It's all right."

He can't understand why an angel should be crying for the loss of a heaven he hasn't lost but it's the wrong time to bring bring it up. 

"I miss him." Aziraphale says, wrapped in Crowley's arms. "I think I loved him. I loved him so much. I can't remember his name."

"God?" Asks Crowley, clutching at straws, trying to understand.

"No." Says Aziraphale falling asleep.

•

"It is a sin to pray for the souls of the damned." Said a priest in rural 18th century France. 

You and I know that's not true.  
Furthermore, it's cruel. 

I say it's a sin to say something like that to those who grieve for dead sinners. 

That's why we, humanity, find comfort in the idea of purgatory, if we believe in it. There needs to be a temporary hell, for justice's sake, but it needs to be escapable, for mercy's sake. And not just mercy on the departed but on the souls of those who loved them. Love them still.

It is said that heaven is eternal bliss, but I say 

Can it be so without the souls of my most loved ones? If it is true that the father's house is full of many rooms, then what is the point of it if not all the rooms are full? Can it really be called heaven to wander- no, run amidst clouds and columns and corridors crying out the name of my beloved and hearing no response for all eternity? 

Dare we hope all men be saved?

•

"I've meant to ask, my dear, but I never have. What is your real name?"

"Aziraphale," replies Crowley, offended, "my name is my real name."

"Your old name, I mean. Your angel name."

"I don't see why you'd want to know my angel name. I'm not an angel anymore. I hated being an angel. It wasn't the real me. That wasn't my real name, and it's not any realer than my name now on account of being older."

"I'm sorry," says Aziraphale, "I didn't know it was a rude question to ask."

"It's okay." Crowley says. "You didn't know. You know now."

•

He remembers the old name. It had fit him ill, like a skin that was too tight and scratchy. And with that name, there's the space of another name that he feels he should remember, and with it is a gentle tinkling laugh and a warm broad smile, and he doesn't know whose. 

Crowley had a friend once too, a most dear friend who stayed upstairs. Sometimes he feels the sun on his back and misses him. 

Misses whom?

•

"Crowley, my dear, I'm sorry, but we can't." Says Aziraphale, pulling away sorrowfully. 

Crowley can taste the broken kiss on his lips. 

"Why?"

"It wouldn't be fair to you. Look, there's someone else."

"Aziraphale, I know your life and I know you're not seeing someone else. What are you trying to do here?"

"Was. There was someone, but I lost him long ago."

"Are you really staying loyal to the memory of a dead human? It's not fitting for the living to spend their lives mourning the dead. It doesn't honour them. That's not living. If you need time to move on, I won't pressure you, but you can't stay forever hung up on a memory in the past. Aziraphale, I love you. I don't usually say things like this, but I can love and I do love and and I love you more than more than I've ever loved at all."

"He wasn't human." Aziraphale says, and Crowley wonders if Aziraphale has heard him at all. "He was an angel, but then he fell. That's why it wouldn't be fair to you. I wouldn't want to use you to fill the gap left by one fallen angel with another."

"Are you telling me you can't kiss me because you're staying faithful to some stupid bloody demon? Then what has all this been about? The holding hands, the candle-light dinners, the times–"

"Don't call him that."

"I'm not finished: the times we conversed together baring and sharing our deepest burdens, the times it was cold and we embraced each other for warmth, but not just for warmth, the sweet nothings, the shy invitations to go outdoors and do nothing but do it together–"

Aziraphale looks torn.  
"–please stop."

Crowley's volume is rising. "–the times the customers in the bookshop mistook me for your damned husband because of the way we were around each other, the times we got drunk and you put your arm around my waist and carried me to the couch and brought me a pillow and a blanket and tucked me in and gently caressed my face when you thought I was asleep and wished me sweet dreams, the gifts out of season and without reason, the arm you always rest around my shoulder when I'm driving–"

"Stop!"

There is a silence. 

"I hope he's worth it, this demon of yours." Says Crowley quietly. "I hope to God and Satan that he is. Is he?"

"I don't know." Says Aziraphale. "I've forgotten what he was called." 

"Well," says Crowley, stepping into his car and closing the door, "you'd better let me bloody know when you remember."

•

After that, it's all... civil. Which is a start in building things back up again. You take a romantic friendship, strip it of romance, and try your very best to keep the friendship alive, though the new skin is raw and stinging. 

It's hard to build a tower back up when you've taken out the brick that was at the bottom of the tower, whether it be a game of Jenga or the mighty Babel herself, and it's even harder when the brick you took out of the foundations is that great brick that is called Affection. 

You're not sure how much of it is allowed anymore. You're not sure what is allowed anymore. 

•

The faithful flounder when the old law is abolished.

•  
The song goes like this: 

It was a cold November night/ so many years ago/ when good Saint Cement testified/ the faith that we now know/... And therefore on Saint Clement's night/ we go a-Clementing.

"Not a lot of other carols for November, are there?" Asks Aziraphale as Crowley takes the tape out of the Blaupunkt to keep it from transforming. 

"Not a lot, no."  
Before, Crowley would have made a joke about being glad the tape was finished, and not having to listen to his blessed musica sacra, though they both know he likes the melodies. He's not sure if that's allowed anymore. 

"You're shivering." Aziraphale says, and opens his arms towards Crowley.

Crowley looks at him with his head tilted sideways till he remembers, and Aziraphale puts down his empty hands on his own knees and sighs. 

"I don't see why it has so be this way now. I miss you and you're right here. You know what? I remembered his name in a dream last night and it doesn't matter. I probably wouldn't recognize him now. You were right. I don't want to spend the rest of forever latched to the memory of something that doesn't exist anymore when you are real and here. You're my best friend and more. I really do love you too."

Then there is the sound of arms wrapping around each other tightly. 

"You're back."  
"I'm back."

The hug is warm and is the sort of thing that will live on forever after it is over. 

"Just out of curiosity," Crowley whispers, "what was the name?"  
"Gadre'el."

Crowley freezes.  
"That's impossible."  
"What do you mean?"  
"That was me."

Then Aziraphale starts laughing, and it is a joyful laughter and it is a laughter at himself for being such a fool, and then Crowley understands too and starts laughing too and then they are kissing again laughing and Aziraphale is kissing Crowley's neck with hints of teeth and tongue and somebody is moaning between laughs and leaning backwards and somebody's face, or both faces, are wet with happy tears and their hands are on each other everywhere, moving and suddenly their clothes don't exist and their skin is soft and warm to the touch and there is sensation and movement and a growing pleasure, and after the pleasure there is a flash, and after the flash there is a warm, sated feeling, and after that, there is a still small voice. 

"Gadre'el."  
"It's Crowley now. But yeah."  
"Crowley." Says Aziraphale, and it's a much lovelier name, and you can tell from Aziraphale's face and voice how much it means to him. 

"Can't believe I didn't recognize you all these years, angel." Crowley says, lazily brushing some hair off of the face above him.  
"Can't believe I didn't recognize you either."  
"Silly us."  
"Found you now, though."  
"Funny, that. We were never lost in the first place."


End file.
